


In the Temple of Dust

by I_prefer_the_term_antihero



Category: The Legend of Zelda & Related Fandoms, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Cute, Forgotten Temple, Gen, Ghosts, Hurt/Comfort, Mild Angst, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Past Lives, Prompt Fic, Prompt Fill, Reincarnation, Ruins, prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-26
Updated: 2021-01-26
Packaged: 2021-03-12 09:34:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29008380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/I_prefer_the_term_antihero/pseuds/I_prefer_the_term_antihero
Summary: After Link completes all the shrines, even though he's stronger than he's ever been...he still isn't sure he can be the hero everyone expects him to be. So some old friends try to cheer him up. Or...maybe they're something else entirely.
Kudos: 16





	In the Temple of Dust

**Author's Note:**

> I've been playing Breath of the Wild for the first time lately, so when Tale Foundry's prompt this week ended up being "In the City of Dust" that's immediately where my mind went to, haha! I had to get the BotW fic idea out of my system first. I've also wanted to write a BotW fic since starting, and I thought this would be the perfect opportunity! 
> 
> This was also a bit inspired by a couple youtube videos: Zeltik's video on the Forgotten Temple potentially being Skyloft, and the Deathly Loneliness Attacks amv.
> 
> I hope you enjoy it! If you do, please consider leaving a comment!!

The hero took a look behind him at the crumbling columns and moss covered stones, the tree breaking out of the wall, and the now destroyed guardians lying among the ruins like the rest, a great sigh of this place, the last things alive silenced.

This whole place felt like a memory, long buried. What once must have been a grand temple now home to skeletons and monsters…and sometimes creatures that were both

He wished he remembered. 

He turned forward and made his way to the foot of the goddess, where three chests sat waiting.

As his steps sounded, he heard the faint notes of music. Something like an ocarina. He looked around for the lone player, but there was nothing, no ghosts nor memory. Just, imagination or hallucination. 

Did he know this place somewhere, sometime? Now it was nothing more than forgotten; forgotten by more than him alone, enough that that was a part of its name.

The goddess smiled down upon him from her place on high, the statue here taller than any of the others he’d seen, like the people who once lived here were closer to her than anyone else. 

He bowed his head to say an extra thanks for good measure. 

As he knelt down before the chests, and reached out to open one, his throat held his heart. 

This was it. This was the reward of more than a hundred shrines worth of work. The worth of the weight of the world. Surely this would be far more than an ordinary weapon or arrow. This would be the treasure of ages. 

It clicked, and he raised the lid. Sitting in the belly of the treasure chest was a green tunic.

He paused a moment to look at it quizzically, before gently reaching in and pulling it out, observing the craftsmanship, the design…trying not to feel disappointed. He wouldn’t have thought the armor of ages would be so plain. But he shouldn’t judge it for looks alone. Surely it was very valuable. 

He lay it across his leg and moved on to the next chest. This was a pair of pants to go with the tunic, and the final, a hat, something like a nightcap.

Before he let disappointment overtake him, he decided to put them on. Surely he’d feel something when he did—stronger maybe? They had to be special, important, powerful. They couldn’t be anything less.

But when he put them on, he didn’t feel any stronger, any braver, any better equipped for life’s trials.

He looked at his reflection in a rusty shield in a last ditch attempt to unearth some sort of memory from his subconscious, but only more memoryless mind remained. 

The echo of a hero. That’s what he always saw. Echo of a voice laid to rest a hundred years ago. A simple green tunic, without any special abilities, wouldn’t change that.

His face twisted as he groaned, pulling his sword from his back, and swinging it angrily at the air before shoving it into the ground, the sword that seals the darkness merely a stake in the mud, a monument to a lost cause.

He thought this sword would prove his worth, to others as well as himself. When that didn’t work, he thought completing all the shrines would give him answers, make him feel like the hero they all said he was. And though he was stronger than ever, it seemed the emptiness was deeper than that.

He sat on the edge of the staircase.

“Aren’t heroes supposed to have some special powers or something?” he scoffed to the empty air, leaning back against the staircase. “Or at least a sidekick? A memory to their name?” a pause. “I’m sorry I just...” A whisper: “I don’t know if I can save Hyrule after all.”

“ _What are you talking about?”_ He started at the sound of a child’s laugh…though the voice sounded oddly distant. 

As he reached for the sword he found the speaker was resting his arms casually on the sword. He was indeed a child, but one that looked…oddly similar to himself. Not to mention, well…half transparent. 

“ _You’ve had many powers over the centuries. ”_ He almost jumped as he saw another version of himself.

“ _I could control the wind! ”_ Another raised his hand, this one a child too, even younger than the first. 

“ _I could walk on walls, and between worlds._ ” If he wasn’t mistaken, it was the painting on the far wall that spoke—he was sure it hadn’t been there before.

“ _I could become whatever I wanted to be, through the power of putting on a mask, ”_ said one leaning against the shrine, hiding his face. 

“ _I could control time, ”_ said the original speaker.

“ _But that doesn’t make you a hero.”_ A wolf with strange markings walked in silently, and spoke seemingly with his thoughts. 

“Can’t…Can’t you take me back to her then?” the hero asked the ghost of the first speaker. “Before all this started?”

He’d seen more than one ghost before—they even gave power to him. He knew there were enough strange things about this world to be all too fazed by this sight. Besides, perhaps it was just a dream after all. Best enjoy it while it lasts, rather than waste time being freaked out. 

The child smiled. “ _Time was my game. This... ”_ he backed up, lifting his hands to gesture around him. “ _This is yours. ”_

“What is?”

“ _Why this world, of course! ”_

“ _It’s so wide, ”_ the shadowed one spoke. 

“ _You’re freer than you’ve ever been,”_ said the wolf

“I guess…”

“ _What’s wrong? ”_

“I mean, sure I’ve defeated monsters, and helped some people, and succeeded at the trials but—! What’s that matter if I don’t remember anything? I just…I don’t feel like the hero they all want me to be.” 

“ _Do you think any of us felt like a hero? All we did was go around defeating monsters. ”_

“ _And go on adventures! ”_ The wind one said, and they chuckled in reply.

“ _Did you ever consider that maybe being a hero was about more than that?”_ the time one spoke. “ _About something in here?_ " He touched his heart, (though the hero couldn’t feel his fingers).

“ _And he doesn’t mean the spirit orbs!”_ the wind one called, and the others laughed.

“ _You already have it in you.”_ He held out the sword to him. _“I promise.”_

“...Does…” He took the sword, observing his reflection in the metal. “Does it have to be this lonely?

“ _What are you talking about?”_

Another version walked out, one who perhaps looked more like himself than the rest, and for a brief moment this place was a city in the clouds. This one’s eyes flicked briefly to the sword before saying, 

“ _You’ve never been alone.”_

Link looked around at all the ghosts, seemingly of his past selves, who all smiled in turn, and finally noticed they were all wearing the green tunic. The same one he got from the chests, now placed on his own. 

“ _Now go kick Ganon’s butt!”_ The wind one put a fist in the air.

More laughter, even a few cheers, and Link smiled, rubbing the back of his neck as he replied.

“Well…I suppose I can at least try.” 

The world breathed, and he shut his eyes against the wind. When he opened them again, they were gone.

The scene was a strange one to be sure, and he’d never profess to understand it. He still wasn’t quite sure he’d ever feel like the hero they all expected him to be. But as Link picked up the Master Sword, and walked back out in the world, the words of ghosts and lost memory ringing real in his head, he felt, at the very least, more like a hero than he did yesterday.

**Author's Note:**

> Please note that I have a very limited knowledge of the Zelda series as a whole (and I have actually not reached this point in my game yet)...so please forgive me if there were any inaccuracies! I tried my best, and I hope it was cool!


End file.
